Love Birds - Blog Hop - Blog Candy

Hello everyone! You may have arrived here from Julie's blog if you are following the BBTB2 blog hop. Either way, welcome!

I am finally back to blogging.  I was busy most of last week with one thing or another and the week finally reached its pinnacle on Saturday when Doug and I moved our younger son into his first non-university housing apartment.... On the third floor... With no elevator! (But mom, the rent is cheaper on the third floor!).  :-D  We manged to survive and Ian's apartment is adorable!!!  Far better than my first apartment!

So now that you know where I have been, let's move on to BBTB2!  It is time for the monthly blog hop and this week's challenge was selected by our wonderful Design Team sister, Maria, who asked us to use one or more of the lovely hearts from the Love Struck cartridge.  I chose the love birds.

I created a fold out card using Just Because Cartridge.  I cut an envelop, then used my trimmer to remove the side flaps.  I scored the two fold lines created a half circle fold down flap (see the photo above), a center 4 x 4 area, and an oblong oval flap (see the photo below). 

For the front of the card I cut the love birds heart from Love Struck in pale pink.  I cut the shadow in white. I used copic marks and highlighted random hearts and the birds.  I added satin hearts and a crystallized Prima rose to the front of the card.  I wrapped the lower flap with a dotted one inch ribbon and added an additional satin heart and heart stick pin. 

I added a white circle stamped with a simple sentiment to the inside of the flip down flap.

Inside the card I used Lacey Labels and cut a scalloped square, the trim for the square, and the old school Love Story style LOVE. 

I liked that this card was not my usual single fold card.  I enjoyed the more creative folds and style.  Now let's get on to the good stuff!  I have wonderful BLOG CANDY!  Thanks to Custom Crops I have a $25.00 gift voucher for one lucky winner.  Just leave a comment below before you hop on and you will be registered for the blog candy.

It is now time for you to continue along on the BBTB2 blog hop!  Your next stop is at the blog of our amazing Design Team sister, Penny.  I had the pleasure of meeting Penny in person last summer and I so enjoyed meeting Penny and her daughter, Krista.  Both are lovely and delightful!

I will be back tomorrow when I have a snowy layout to share.

Gluten-Free Chocolate Chip Cookie Recipes

The best gluten-free chocolate chip cookie recipes on GFG.

It's a cool rainy Sunday here in West Hollywood. I am sipping a hot coconut milk chai to the velvet croon of Chet Baker. And I am thinking about cookies. Not just any cookies. Gluten-free chocolate chip cookies. The best of the best. Sifting through my variations like a saxophone player in the groove of a beat. How do I like them best? That is the question. Because cookies will be baked today. And I've got a handful of chocolate chip cookie recipes to choose from. I've got choices.

Maybe I'll go with a classic style, bumpy with heavenly chunks of a vegan dark chocolate bar. Or the slightly chewy-crisp favorites made with gluten-free rolled oats from Bob's Red Mill. Wait. But then I remember my buckwheat flour chocolate chip cookies. Slightly sweet and verging on cakey. Perfect with a glass of cold vanilla rice milk. And then, to make matters even more complicated, I suddenly crave my quinoa flake cookie dough seductively studded with dark chocolate chips.

Decisions. Decisions.


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Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough Cupcakes. . . . . yeah, you heard me.

Kiddo's birthday was last week and he LOOOOOOOOOOVES cookie dough.
{So does his mother...it's hereditary.}

I knew exactly what to make him for his birthday cake, Cheryl's Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough Cupcakes.


Let me break these bad boys down for you....

First, there is a chocolate chip cookie cupcake. Then, they are filled with chocolate chip cookie dough filling.  And finally, they are topped with a brown sugar cookie dough frosting.

{Yeah, you don't WANT to know the WW points on these puppies.}

For the cupcakes and the filling, I'm going to link you to Cheryl's printable recipe.  The only change I made on those was to add just a *pinch* of salt to the filling.  You could totally skip that if you wanted.

I changed up the frosting just a bit, so here is that recipe...

Brown Sugar Cookie Dough Frosting

3 sticks unsalted butter, room temp.
3/4 c. light brown sugar, packed
1 lb. box powdered sugar
1/2 tsp. coarse salt
3 TBSP milk
2 and &1/2 tsp vanilla
mini chocolate chips

Cream the butter and brown sugar with the paddle attachment until fluffy.  Add in the powdered sugar and beat on low until incorporated, then increase the speed and beat until smooth and combined.  Add the salt, milk and vanilla; blend until smooth.

Frost the cupcakes. (I used a Bakery Crafts 9CS tip.)  Sprinkle with mini chocolate chips.



Now, it's time for the candles.

And I have NO IDEA how this happened, but the reflection of the flames made ♥'s in the picture.  Is that cool, or what?!?!?


{Here's what 12 looks like around here.....sweaty hair, flared nostrils, fruit punch mustache and all. ♥}

Peggy Loves Vintage - whatever you do...don't forget!!!

Happy Sunday everyone! Sure hope you're enjoying your weekend! We've actually got a little bit of weather here today. It's cloudy and we've had a mix of rain and snow showers. So it's starting to look a little more like winter than spring. Today I've got a card for you featuring another one of the adorable images from Peggy's new Cutie Couples Cutouts over at Peggy Loves Vintage. These images are soooo much fun! This card took me absolutely no time to make! I just cropped out this picture, printed up on cardstock and assembled the card.

I think this image is so funny!! Her whomping him on top of the head with her rolling pin, and him waving his little home sweet home sign. LMBO!  The sentiment is one of my own of course that I just printed up using Microsoft Word onto cardstock. The cardstock is Bazzill and the DP are from Nitwit Collections. I added some faux stitching around the panels.

So if you're looking for a way to make some cute Valentine's Day cards in a snap, and you like the vintage look, then hurry on over to Peggy Loves Vintage and grab these Cutie Couple Cutouts! You'll love them!  And don't forget to follow Peggy's blog too! She loves to give away free vintage images!!! Thanks so much for stopping by to see me today and hope to see you back again soon! Hugs!

Gluten-Free Cinnamon Raisin Scones

A warm gluten-free scone. Hot tea. Breakfast bliss.

Are you sick of the snow yet? My heart goes out to you. So many of you have been hammered this winter. Spring will arrive this year not a moment too soon. My advice? Bake some scones. Scones are easy to throw together. The oven warms up the kitchen and chases off the chill. And in less than half an hour you have a tender gluten-free morsel to share and savor. Gently spiced with cinnamon and nutmeg, and studded with sweet bursts of raisins, I predict these cinnamon raisin scones will make you smile.

And speaking of predictions, Punxsutawney Phil better man up and predict an early respite come February 2. My fingers are crossed for all of you shoveling out from under. Not that I'm superstitious, or subscribe to the precognitive powers of double furred rodents, but. I remember the long dreary bouts of cold and gray all too well. I spent almost fifty-five years in the grip of Old Man Winter, praying the illustrious marmot would not see his shadow.

Will we have an early spring?

I hope so, Darlings. I hope so.


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Sixty Cent Stamp + Spellbinders = Great Valentines

Today I am going to share a quickie Valentine card ... or two!  But of course there is a bit of a back story with this card.... I know, isn't there always?   A couple of weeks ago the scrappy girlfriends and I spent a lovely weekend at Lake Murray, scrapping, and laughing, and talking weddings...  We always schedule a little break for ourselves on the weekend - we visit Michaels and A.C. Moore craft stores on Saturday afternoons.  We say that while we do not NEED anything, we might find something we should have.  This last trip, four of us purchased new cutters because we all liked Beth's new Fiskar's Deluxe cutter. 
We also looked for great bargains, but usable bargains.  And this is where the card comes in!

My great find on our last Saturday afternoon outing was in the $1.00 stamp bin at Michaels.  All of the $1.00 stamps were 40% off.  I found this cute "here's my heart" contemporary stamp, which only cost me sixty cents!!  And of course I had to use it that evening, just to show "the girls" that I would indeed use that sixty cent stamp!!

I stamped the sixty cent stamp onto smooth cardstock and cut it out with my circle nesties.  I mounted the circle on a Lacey Circle nestie, and mounted that on a double layer matting cut with label 2 (?). 
I used many of my leftover scraps to create two Valentine cards - one for each of the grandmoms. 

So the next time you are digging through those $1.00 bins at Michaels remember that you really can make some cute, cute projects with inexpensive stamps!!

Print YOUR Blog in Book Form! (Works for Me Wednesday)

Several months ago, I mentioned a great company called Blog2Print.  They actually print your blog in book form.

Whether you are a food blogger, or a craft blogger, or a mommy blogger, or a home blogger....or even if you aren't, but you know a blogger.....this is such a cool idea!

When my book came in the mail, I opened it and saw cookies and baking projects that I had already forgotten about.  And I LOVE that kiddo will be able to look back on it someday...and maybe even try some of the recipes!


 
Blog2Print and I are teaming up for the Blissdom blog conference.  I leave for the conference in Nashville tomorrow (and guess who is my roomie!), but while I'm there.....

Blog2Print is offering one of you a $40 credit to print your own book!

To enter:

• go take a look at Blog2Print's site...and then leave a comment here telling why you would love to print your blog....or maybe you would print someone else's blog as a gift for them.

Extra entries (leave a separate comment for each):

• tweet it!Tweet
• follow Blog2Print on twitter

Blog2Print works for me!!!

{If you will be at Blissdom, please come say "hi!"  I'd love to meet you and I'll have my B2P book with me if you'd like to see one up close! And if you're not going, be sure to follow the fun on twitter using the #blissdom hashtag.}


{Drawing will be held Sunday, January 30th at noon, CST. Good luck!} giveaway now closed.

Papertake Weekly - Sketch challenge!

Hi everyone! We made it through another Monday! And that means it's time for a new challenge from Papertake Weekly. This week is sketch week, and I LOVE  Dawny's sketches! We're sponsored this week by the fabulous Simon Says Stamp! 

For my card today, I used this adorable birthday monkey from Dustin Pike. I love his images! They're so fun and whimsical! He's colored with Copic markers Sorry I didn't write down the colors this time.  I cut his out with circle Nesties and petite scalloped Nesties. The papers are from Nitwit Collections Going Bananas and cardstock is Bazzill. Buttons are from my stash and they're threaded with embroidery floss. And of course the ribbon is May Arts green silk from Stamp and Create.

Please be sure and pop over to Papertake Weekly to see what my design team sisters cooked up for your viewing pleasure. Then we'd really love it if you'd grab your paper and glue and play along with us. Who knows...you might get lucky and win a fabulous prize from Simon Says Stamp! Thanks so much for stopping by to see me today, and hope to see you back again soon! Hugs!!

Victorian Fan Card with Spellbinders

Hello, today I am sharing a Victorian Fan card that I created using Spellbinders dies.  This card began as an experiment to see if I could cut a folded card with a single die.  Well of course I could.  And then it grew from there!

The fan feature was created using strips of cardstock glued together, then scored and folded.  I created two sections of fan - the larger upper section and the tiny lower section.  I would highly recommend a scoring board and tool for creating the fans.  I prescored the lines and then folded.

For the center front of the card I cut the same die shape, only smaller, and centered a sweet thank you verse in the middle of a classic circular nestie.

The card was finished with a bit of old fashioned lace tied in a double bow.  To me this card just screams Victorian, especially with the slight Asian look, which I attribute to the fan and the touch of red in the label.

I will be back tomorrow with another new project to share - and as soon as my new power cord comes for my lap top, I will share the 50 cupcake wrappers I created for my sister-in-law.

Butterflies, butterflies .... But not new

Happy Monday everyone!  Today is supposed to be a Bitten by the Bug 2 post.  However as I have had laptop issues as well as a large cupcake wrapper project going for my sister-in-law, I was unable to finish my butterfly project.  The challenge cut at BBTB2 this week is the cute butterfly from the Once Upon a Princess cartridge.

When it became obvious that I would not finish my butterfly project I thought about sharing the cupcake wrappers that I am creating.  But then I realized that I can do that later in the week and in the meantime we could revisit these fun butterfly cards.  I love the teal and orange color combination and the details in the butterflies. The butterflies were cut using the Sentimentals cartridge.

I will be back tomorrow with a new project to share but in the meantime please do go by the Bitten by the Bug 2 site and check out all of the lovely designs the team has created to share.

And the Golden Globe (cookie) Goes to . . .

.....Jim Parsons (Sheldon) from The Big Bang Theory.

Here's the story....a sweet girl, Lindsay, who I used to work with actually knows Jim.  Yep, I know people who know people. ;)

Turns out that Jim went to the same high school I did although, I'm sure, MANY moons after I graduated.

I've always said that nothing makes me more nervous than making a logo cookie, since I don't have one of those handy-dandy projectors.  Well, I've amended that....nothing makes me more nervous than making logo cookies for a Golden Globe WINNER.
 
{You know what?  Everything looks better with a little ribbon....even a shaky logo.}


Did you know that the Golden Globe award has a little "filmstrip" wrapped around it?  I didn't, either.  That's what those dots and squares are supposed to be. (I used a luster dust called Golden Charm here....I love the color!)


Bazinga!  That's Sheldon's catchphrase.

Congratulations on your Golden Globe, Jim!  You're doing Spring, Texas proud! :) 

Magnolia-licious blog hop winner!!

Sure hope everyone enjoyed their weekend! Hopefully I'm about to make someone a little happier! It's time to announce the winner of my blog candy from the Magnolia-licious blog hop this past Monday. And did you know that Diana already has the You Are So Special stamps collection in stock? They're going fast, so hurry over and get the ones you want now!! So without further ado, here we go:

And #17 is.....

Congrats Beth! Please send me your information so I can get your goodies out to you! Thanks so much to everyone for playing!  Have a wonderful Sunday afternoon!! Hugs!

Gluten-Free Slow Cooker Stew

Hearty and tasty gluten-free slow cooker stew.

Here's a bright and delicious slow cooker stew recipe with sausages - and it's tasty using any sausage you choose, from free-range roaming buffalo to furry-friendly vegan. Scrumptious. Seriously. Make it for the Big Game. You know, the one with a pigskin ball and helmeted men in shiny tights. Throw all the ingredients in a Crock Pot and go root for your favorite tight end. Make a hot artichoke dip and grab some gluten-free chips. Game on.

Go Cubs!

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